The present invention relates generally to microwave waveguide structures, and more particularly, to waveguide power dividers.
Directional couplers that incorporate two waveguide structures are well known in the art. For many years, directional couplers have been designed and papers written describing what are known as 2-way power dividers that are constructed using two adjacent waveguides, the power entering one of the waveguides and being coupled through a coupling slot arrangement to the adjacent waveguide from which power is output in a desired direction. For example, such a device is described in a paper by M. Surdin, entitled "Direction Couplers in Wave Guides", Journal IEEE, Vol 93, pt. IIIA, 1946, p. 725. Also, reference may be made to an article by Dennis C. Cooper, entitled "Waveguide Directional Couplers using Inclined Slots", in Microwave Journal, August, 1966.
There are many applications in the microwave art where multiple directional couplers, ganged together, are required to accomplish a task. For example, microwave antenna feeding systems and subsystems may require multiple power dividers, and the need to keep the weight and dimensions of these devices as small as possible is very important.
In the past, the only way to provide such a structure required the coupling together of multiple conventional 2-way power dividers, each consisting of two waveguides. This solution is both bulky and heavy. In applications where the minimization of space required to fabricate such a power divider is an important factor, such a structure could not be used.
The present invention has the advantage of using the minimum absolute space necessary for a power divider using more than 2 waveguides. This is accomplished using a novel and compact coupling scheme. Thus, it should be recognized that a technique which reduces the weight and space required for a multiple microwave power divider would constitute an important advancement in the art.